Episode 129 – Rosina Lippi – Author of the Wilderness Series
Posted November 4, 2022
Rosina Lippi writes under her own name and under the pseudonym Sara Donati, and her Wilderness series of six historical novels is some of the most gorgeous fiction you’ll ever read. A former linguistics professor, Rosina has been writing for decades and built quite a following, even as the publishing industry has changed.
In the latest episode of the Make Meaning Podcast, host Lynne Golodner interviews Rosina Lippi about how to make fiction your career, frustrations with book marketing, and how to create believable characters in authentic landscapes. In the episode, Rosina quotes George Orwell on writing: “Writing a book is an exhausting struggle. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand.”
In this episode, Lynne and Rosina discuss:
- Making money as a novelist
- Historical fiction
- Retelling history with real women in the stories
- Choosing a pen name to not “confound reader expectations”
- How publishing has changed over the decades
- How to authentically show race, indigeneity and survival in colonial times
- Marketing & PR for books
- How to handle negative feedback on your writing
Links and Resources:
- Rosina Lippi
- Into the Wilderness (book 1)
- Sara Donati
- Elizabeth Bennet
- The Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper
- The Pen/Hemingway award
- Congo Square
- Kirkus Review
- Stranger than Fiction film
Find Rosina Lippi:
You can find all of the Make Meaning Podcast episodes on YouTube.